'I

,
,I
BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS NazismandAnti-Fascism1933-1939
"I
Gruppenfuhrer Ernst, who is suspected of having been involved in the I.e., using all the means available, even the most teeble. For even
i:1
:1
execution of the Reichstag Fire. The authenticity of his testament is
I
worse than the illusion that it is possible to eradicate unnecessary
'II'
disputed. TheWinterAid was a collection, and subsequentlya direct tax,
established by the Nazis in 19.1.1 to help the needy. It was later used to
finance rearmament.
38
IntheFightAgainstInjusticeEven WeakWeaponsAre
ofUse
In the year following the war I, like many others, thought that
institutionsliketheLeagueofHumanRightsweredefunct.Ididnot
goas far assome,whoaccusedthisorganisationof beingdownright
harmful by awakening the illusion that its methods could actually
control the monstrous, unnecessary misery which stems from the
wrong system of production, and which can therefore only be
eradicated ifthissystemis changedcompletely. Ididnotwanttogo
thisfar, butItoobelieved that pacifismwouldachieve nothing, for
eventhoughit hadnoprospectof changingthecauses,itstillunder-
took to combat wars, which were only consequential phenomena,
andtodosodirectly,with nobeatingaboutthebush,butusingonly
theweakestweapons, suchas individualconscientiousobjectionto
militaryservice.Then,whenGermanybegantotransformitselfinto
a Fascist state, we saw how both the large and small organisations
committed to fighting injustice mobilised. I did not go as f ~ l as
many,whoclaimedtobeobservingawholesale, long-termcollapse
ofthe large-scale organisations which aimed to change the social
structurecompletely,butItoosawthetoughand importantsmall-
scale activities of frequently disparaged organisations like the
LeagueofHumanRights, whichactuallysaved manypeople,which
constantlyanduntiringlyexposedinjusticewithitssmallvoice,and
whichgalvanised manytoreturntothestruggle. So wesawthatthe
fight againstinjusticemustnotonlybewaged in themost ultimate
way, addressing all ofits causes, but also in the most general way,
140
miserywithout removingits causes is the illusion thatwe can fight
thecauseswithouttheirconsequences,separately,withoutrecourse
totheweakestandmostfeeble ofmeans. Ihaveseen howknowing
about these terrible causes actually prevented many people from
combatingtheirterribleconsequences.
Howcan someonewhoplaces himselfin thehandsofthepolice
be surprised, they asked, when he is beaten with cudgels, or when
injustice triumphsover someone who appeals to courts like ours?
Theyforgotentirelythatonedoesnotneed tobesurprisedin order
to complain, and that one's own opinions about the police and
courts are not shared by everyone else, and that opinions are
certainly not enough to change the police and courts. The slogan
still applies: he who wants to resist unnecessary misery cannot
afford torelinquisheven theweakest ofweapons.
['M"II /III1>S d"s Ullfccllf ilUeil lI1il scln1'llchcII Mille/II bckiill1p!"II',
BrA22/61-2.]
TypescriptC.19.14. TheInternationalLeagueofHumanRightswasfounded
in 11'91', the Ccrman League in 1919. It was niticised bygroupson the left
for focusing on Utopian aims and individual rights, without concerning
itself with the sort of social order which might make those rights
meaningful. It was banned bythe Nazis in 19.1J.
39
Five Difficulties inWritingtheTruth
Todayanyonewhowantstofightliesandignoranceandtowritethe
truth has to overcome at least five difficulties. He must have the
courage to writethetruth,eventhough it is suppressedeverywhere;
thecleverness torecogniseit,eventhoughitis disguisedeverywhere;
the skill to make it fit for use as a weapon; theJudgement to select
those in whosehandsit will becomeeffective;thecunfling tospread
141
','I(
"
II
"
I
11
1 ",1'
11
1
,I;
11,1
II:
Iii
Iii
il!
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I:
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iii
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ii,
BRECHT ON ART AND POLITlCS
it amongst them. These difficulties are great for those who write
under Fascism, but they also exist for those who were driven out or
have fled, indeed, even for those who write in the lands of bourgeois
freedom.
The courage to write the truth
It appears self-evident that the writer should write the truth in the
sense that he should not suppress it or hush it up and that he should
write nothing which is untrue. He should not give in to the power-
ful, he should not deceive the weak. Of course, it is very difficult not
to give in to the powerful, and very advantageous to deceive the
weak. Displeasing the property owners means renouncing property.
Relinquishing the payment for work you have done may mean
relinquishing the work, and rejecting fame amongst the powerful
oftcn means rejecting fame in general. That takes courage. Times of
the most extreme oppression are mostly times when thc talk is often
of great and noble things. It takes courage to speak at times like this
of such base and petty things as the food and housing of the workers,
right in the middle of a mighty hullabaloo that it is sacrifice that
counts. When the farmcrs are being showered with honours, it takes
courage to speak of machines and cheap fodder which would make
their honoured work easier. When from every radio station the
message screams out that a man without knowledge and education
is better than a knowledgeable man, then it takes courage to ask:
bettcr for whom? When the talk is of perfect and imperfect races, it
takes courage to ask whether hunger and ignorance and war do not
produce terrible disfigurations. Equally, it takes courage to say the
truth about oneself, the defeated. Many who are persecuted lose the
ability to recognise their flaws. To them persecution seems the
greatest injustice. The persecutors are, by definition, the bad guys;
they, the persecuted, are persecuted because of their goodness. But
this goodness has been beaten, defeated and frustrated, and so it was
a weak goodness, a poor, unsustainable, unreliable goodness; for it
won't do to grant goodness its weakness, like rain its wetness. To say
that the good were defeated, not because they were good, but because
they were weak, that takes courage. Of course, in the struggle with
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Nazism and Anti-Fascism 19:33-19)9
untruth the truth has to be written, and it must not be something
general, high-flown, or ambiguous. Indeed, this general, high-
flown, ambiguous quality is precisely that of untruthfulness. Wlwl1
it is said of someone that he has spoken the truth, that must mean,
in the first place, that several, or many, or just one, have said
something different, a lie or something general, but he has said I he
truth, something practical, factual, undeniable, which went to the
heart of the matter.
It takes little courage to lament in general the wickedness of the
world and the triumph of brutality, and to threaten that the spirit
will triumph in the one part of the world where this is still allowed.
Many take this as their text and make their entrance as if cannons
were trained on them, whereas in fact only opera glasses are trained
on them. They yell their universal demands into a world of friends
of the harmless. They demand universal justice, for which they have
never lifted a finger, and the universal freedom to share in the loot
which has long been shared with them anyway. They think only that
which sounds beautiful can be true. If the truth is numerical, dry,
factual, something which requires effort and study, then it is not
truth for them, not something which can bewitch them. They only
have the outward demeanour of those who tell the truth. The
wretched thing with them is: they do not know the truth.
2 The clevemess to recognise the truth
Since it is difficult to write the truth because it is suppressed
everywhere, most people think that whether or not the truth is
written depends on convictions. They believe that it only takes
courage. They f(Jrget the second difficulty, that of/inding the truth.
There can be no suggestion that it is easy to find the truth.
First of all it is not even easy to find out which truth is worth
saying. For example, at this time, in full view of the whole world, olle
after another of the great civilised states is sinking into the most
extreme form of barbarism. Moreover, everyone knows thilt the
internal war, which is being waged with the most terrible means,
may turn any day into external war, which may reduce our part of
the world to a heap of rubble. That is without doubt one truth, but
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BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS
there are of course more truths besides. Thus it is not untrue, for
example, that chairs have seats and that rain falls down from above.
Many poets write truths of this kind. They are like painters who
cover the walls of sinking ships with still lifes. Our first difficulty
does not exist for them, and yet they have a clear conscience.
Undeterred by the powerful, but at the same time not deterred by
the screams of the ravaged, they dab at their pictures. The non-
sensical nature of their actions produces a 'profound' pessimism in
them, which they sell for good prices, and which would actually be
more justified in others - in the face of these masters and their sales.
And yet it is not even easy to recognise that their truths are the sort
which concern chairs or rain; they usually sound quite different, just
like truths about important matters. For artistIC treatment consists
precisely in bestowing importance on something.
It is not until you look more closely that you recognise that they
are only saying: a chair is a chair, and: no one can do anything to
stop rain falling down from above.
These people have not found the truth which is worth writing
about. Others in their turn really do concern themselves with the
most urgent tasks, fear neither the powerful nor a life of poverty, but
they still cannot find the truth. They lack knowledge. They are full
of the old superstition, of tlmous prejudices often beautifully
shaped in the olden days. The world is too complicated for them,
they do not know the facts and do not see the connections. Apart
from convictions, what is needed is knowledge, which can be
acquired, and method, which can be learned. What all writers need
in this time of complexity and great changes is a knowledge of the
materialist dialectic, of economics, and of history. This can be
acquired by means of books and practical instruction, so long as the
necessary diligence is there. One can discover many truths by
relatively simple means, parts of the truth or evidence which leads
to the truth. If one wants to search, then it is good to have a method,
but one can also find without a method, indeed, even without
searching. But with this haphazard approach one will scarcely
achieve a representation of truth such that, on the basis of that
representation, people will know how they should act. People who
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Nazism and Anti-Fascism 1933-1939
only write down little facts are not in a position to make the things
of this world manageable. But the truth has only this purpose,
none other. These people are not up to the challenge of writing the
truth.
If someone is prepared to write the truth and capable of
recognising it, there still remain three difficulties.
3 The skill to lIlake the trllth fit fen use as a weapon
The truth must be spoken because of the consequences which
follow from it for behaviour. One example which shows us the kind
of truth from which no consequences or the wrong consequences
can be drawn is the widespread view that in some countries terrible
conditions prevail, which originate in barbarism. According to this
view, Fascism is a wave of barbarism which has descended on several
lands with the force of a natural disaster.
According to this view, Fascism is a new, third power next to (and
above) capitalism and socialism; not only the socialist movement, it
is argued, hut capitalism also could have continued to prosper, had
it not been for Fascism. This is, of course, a Fascist claim, a
capitulation to Fascism. Fascism is a historic phase which capitalism
has entered into, and in this sense it is both new and at the same time
old. In Fascist countries capitalism only survives as Fascism, and
Fascism CIln only he resisted as CIlpitalislll, as the //lost naked, lmlzen,
oppressive, and deceitfill form ofCIlpitalislll.
How does someone propose to speak the truth about Fascism, to
which he is opposed, if he does not propose to speak out against
capitalism, which produces it? What are the practical consequences
of his truth supposed to be?
Those who are against Fascism without being against capitalism,
who wail about the barbarism that comes from barbarism, are like
people who want to eat their share of the calf without the calf being
slaughtered. They want to eat veal, but they can't stand the sight of
blood. They are satisfied if the butcher washes his hands before he
brings out the meat. They are not against the conditions of owner-
ship which produce barbarism, just against the barbarism. They
raise their voices against barbarism, and they do so in countries in
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BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS
which the same conditions of ownership prevail, but where the
butchers still wash their hands before they bring out the meat.
Loud accusations against barbaric measures may work for a short
time, for as long as the listeners believe that these sorts of measures
would be out of the question in their own countries. Certain
countries are in a position to uphold their conditions of ownership
with less violent measures than others. For them democracy still
performs the services for which others have to call on violence,
namely the guarantee of ownership of the means of production. The
monopoly capitalism of factories, mines and estates creates barbaric
conditions everywhere; however, these are not so immediately
visible. Barbarism becomes visible as soon as that monopoly can
only be protected by open violence.
Some countries which do not yet need, for the sake of the barbaric
monopolies, to renounce the formal guarantees ofthe rule oflaw, or
such comforts as art, philosophy and literature, particularly enjoy
listening to their guests when these accuse their homeland of having
renounced such comtllrts, since they will profit from this in the wars
which <In' expecled. Are we to S<lY that such people have recognised
tile truth, those, for example, who demand loudly: an unrelenting
fight against Cermany 'for this is the true home of evil in this age,
the branch offIces of hell, the abode of the Alltichrist'? We should
ratlwr say that Ihey are foolish, helpless and harmful people. For this
gossIp would lead to the conclusion that the country should be
eliminated. The whole country with all its people, for poison gas
docs not seek out the guilty ones when it kills.
The thoughtless man, who docs not know the truth, expresses
himself in generalisations, in high-flown and vague language. He
blathers on about 'the' Germans, he whinges about Evil, and even
with the best will his listener cannot know what to do. Should he
decide not to be a Cerman? Will hell disappear, if he is good? The
talk about the barbarism that comes from barbarism is also of this
ilk. According to this view, barbarism comes from barbarism, and
comes to an end by means of civilised behaviour, which comes from
eJuLltion. TI1<1t is all terribly general, not said for the sake of the
(I)))SC'IILClllCS tilr ,Iltion, and essentially said to no one.
146
Nazism and Anti-Fascism 1933-1939
Such accounts show only a few links in the causal chain and
depict certain motive forces as uncontrollable forces. Such accounts
contain a lot of obscurity, concealing the forces which cause cata-
strophes. Cast just a little light on the matter, and suddenly human
beings appear as the perpetrators of the catastrophes! For we live in
an age where man's destiny is man.
Fascism is not a natural disaster which can simply be understood
from human 'nature'. But even in the case of natural disasters there
are methods of depiction which are worthy of man because they
appeal to his ability to resist.
After a great earthquake which destroyed Yokohama, many
American magazines published photographs depicting a field of
rubble. Underneath was the caption 'steel stood', and indeed, any-
one, who at first glance had only seen ruins, noticed - now that the
caption had drawn attention to them - that several tall buildings
had remained standing. Of all the possible depictions of an earth-
quake, the ones of unparalleled importance are those by the
construction engineers, those which take note of the sh ifts in the
ground, the strength of the tremors, the developing heat, etc., and
which lead to constructions which withstand earthquakes. Anyone
who wants to describe Fascism and war, the great disasters which are
not natural disasters, must produce a practicable form of truth. He
must show that these are catastrophes which are brought 011 the
huge masses of working people, who lack their own means of
production, by the owners of these means of production.
If one wants to write the truth about terrible conditions success-
fully, one has to write it in such a way that the avoidable causes of
these conditions can be recognised. Once the avoidable causes are
recognised, the terrible conditions can be resisted.
4 The judgement to select those in whose hands the truth becomes
effective
Owing to the centuries-old customs of trading written goods on
the market of opinions and descriptions, so that the writer was
relieved of the worry over what to do with the written text, the writer
had the impression that his client or patron, the middleman, was
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BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS
passing on his written work to everyone. He thought: I speak, and
those who want to listen will hear me. In reality he spoke; and those
who could pay heard him. What he said was not heard by everyone,
and those who did hear it did not want to hear everything. On this
subject a lot has been said already, although it is still too little; I only
want to emphasise here that 'writing for someone' has turned into
simply 'writing'. The truth, however, cannot simply be written; you
absolutely have to write it for someone, someone who is able to use
it. Recognising the truth is a process shared by writers and readers,
In order to say what is good, you need to be a good listener and to
hear what is good. The truth must be said with calculation and
listened to with calculation. And for us writers it is important whom
we tell it to and who tells it to us.
We have to tell the truth about the terrible conditions to those for
whom these conditions are worst, and we must learn it from them.
We need to talk not only to the people who have particular con-
victions, but also to those people who, by rcason of their situation,
should share these convictions. And your listeners change
continually! Even the hangmen can be spoken to, when the payment
for hanging stops coming in, or when the danger becomes too great.
The Bavarian peasants were opposed to any revolution, but when
the war had lasted long enough and their sons returned home and
no longer found a place in the farmyards, then they could be won
over for the revolution.
It is important for writers to hit the right tone of truth. Usually
you hear a very soft, melancholy tone, the tone of people who could
not hurt a fly. Anyone who hears this tone and is in a wretched state
becomes more wretched. People who talk like this may not be your
enemies, but they are certainly no fellow fighters. The truth is war-
like, it does not only fight against untruthfulness, but also against
certain people who spread untruth.
5 The cWlning to spread the truth amongst many
Man y, proud that they have the courage to tell the truth, happy to
have found it, perhaps tired from the work which it costs to put it in
a serviceable form, waiting impatiently for those whose interests they
148
Nazism and Anti-Fascism 1933-1939
are defending to take hold of it, do not consider it necessary on top of
all of this to use especial cunning when spreading the truth. Thus the
whole effect of their work often comes to nought. In every age when
the truth was suppressed and disguised, cunning was used to spread
it. Confucius falsified an old patriotic calendar of historical events. He
only changed certain words. When it said, 'The ruler of Kun had the
philosopher Wan killed because he said this and that', Confucius
replaced killed with 'murdered'. If it said that such-and-such a tyrant
had been assassinated, he replaced this with 'executed'. By these
means Confucius paved the way for a new assessment of history.
Anyone in our times who says population instead of' Volk' and
land ownership instead of 'soil' is already denying his support to
many lies. He divests the words of their lazy mysticism. The word
Volk implies a certain unity and hints at common interests, so it
should only be used in reference to several Vblker, f(H only then is a
commonality of interests conceivable. The population of an area of
land has different, even opposing interests, and this is a truth which
is suppressed. Thus anyone who says 'soil', and describes the fields
to nose and eyes by speaking of their earthy scent and their colour,
is supporting the lies of the rulers; for what matters is not the fertility
of the soil, nor man's love of it, nor his diligence, but instead
principally the price of grain and the price of labour. The people
who draw the profits from the soil are not those who harvest the
grain, and the scent of the clods of earth is unknown on the stock
exchanges. They reek of something different. On the contrary,
'landownership' is the right word; it is less deceptive. For the word
'discipline', wherever oppression rules, the word 'obedience' should
be used, because discipline is possible even without rulers and so has
a more noble quality than obedience. And better than the word
'honour' are the words 'human dignity'. So that the individual does
not vanish so easily from our field of vision. After all, we know what
sort of lowlife will rush forward to be allowed to defend the honour
of a people! And how wastefully those who are well-fed distribute
honours on those who, in feeding them, go hungry. Confucius's
cunning can still be used even today.
Confucius replaced unjustified assessments of national events
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BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS
with justified ones. In Utopia the Englishman Thomas More
described a country in which just conditions prevailed - it was a very
different country from the one in which he lived, but it resembled it
closely, except for the conditions!
Lenin, under threat from the Tsar's police, wanted to describe the
exploitation and oppression of the island Sakhalin by the Russian
bourgeoisie. He replaced Russia with Japan and Sakhalin with
Korea. The methods of the Japanese bourgeoisie reminded all the
readers of those of the Russian bourgeoisie in Sakhalin, but the work
was not forbidden, since Japan and Russia were enemies. A lot of
things which may not be said in Germany about Germany may be
said about Austria.
There are many kinds of cunning which can be used to hoodwink
the suspicious state.
Voltaire fought against the Church's belief in miracles by writing
a gallant poem about the Maid of Orleans. He described the miracle
which must doubtless have occurred for Joan to have remained a
virgin in an army and at court and in the company of monks.
By the elegance of his style and the fact that he described erotic
adventures, derived from the opulent life of the rulers, he enticed
them into exposing the religion which secured them the means for
their lax lifestyle. Indeed, by these means he created the possibility
that his works would reach those for whom they were intended by
illegal routes. The powerful among his readers encouraged or
tolerated the circulation of these works. They thus exposed the
police, who defended their pleasures on their behalf. And the great
Lucretius expressly emphasises his high hopes that the beauty of his
verses would aid the dissemination of Epicurean atheism.
A high literary standard can indeed serve to protect a message.
Often, however, it also arouses suspicion. Then it may be necessary
deliberately to pitch it a few notches lower. That happens, for
example, when descriptions of poor social conditions are smuggled
into the despised genre of the detective novel at unobtrusive points.
Such descriptions might entirely justify a detective novel. Far lesser
considerations led the great Shakespeare to lower the tone in the
speech of Coriolanus's mother, in which she opposes her son who is
150
Nazism and Anti-Fascism 1933-1939
marching against his home city, a speech which he deliberately
fashions so that it lacks force - he wanted Coriolanus to be stopped
from carrying out his plan, not by real reasons or by bemg
profoundly moved, but by the lethargy with which he succumbs to
an old habit. In Shakespeare we also find a model of cunningly
spread truth in Antony's speech at Caesar's corpse. He emphasises
unceasingly that Caesar's murderer Brutus is an honourable man,
but he also describes his deed, and the description of this deed is
more impressive than the description of its perpetrator; the orator
thus allows himself to be defeated by the facts themselves; he lends
them a greater rhetorical force than he grants 'himself'.
An Egyptian poet, who lived four thousand years ago, used a
similar method. It was a period of intense class struggle. With enor-
mous difficulty the hitherto ruling class was fending oft its greatest
adversary, the section of the population which until then had served
it. In the poem a wise man appears at the ruler's court and issues a
warning to fight against the enemy within. He describes at length
and with urgency the disorder which has arisen as a result of the
uprising of the lower classes. The account reads as follows:
'For so it is: the rich are full of complaints and the poor }1111 oIioy.
Every city says: let LIS drive the powerful out ofollr midst.
For so it is: the public offices are opened and their lists taken away; the
serf, are becoming masters.
For so it is: the son of a respected man is no longer recognised; the child o}
the mistress hecomes the son of Iler slave.
For so it is: the burghers have heen set to work at the millstone. '1'hose who
never saw the day have emerged into the light.
For so it is: the ebony chests of sacrifice are broken; the precious sesame
wood is hacked up to make beds.
Behold, the palace has collapsed in one hour.
Behold, the poor of the land have become rich. Behold, he who lacked
bread now owns a barn; his granary is filled with the goods of another.
Behold, it does a man good to eat his meal.
Behold, he who had no corn now owns barns; he who lived on alms of
corn now distributes them himself.
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BRECHT ON ART AND POLlTlCS
Behold, he who hadrIO yokeof oxell IlOW ownsherds; he who could 1I0t
comehyImilllais to pul/hisplough 1I0W OWIIS whole herds of ({Ittle.
Behold, he who could 1I0t Imildashelterfor himself1I0W ownsfour walls.
Behold, thecouncil/orsseek shelterin thegranary; he who was hardy
allowed to rest against the walls 1I0W owns0 hed.
Behold, he who rlever beforehuiltahootfor IlilJlselfIlOW OWIIS ships; when
theirownercomes {ookingfor them, thell tlley ore 110 10llgerhis.
Behold, those whoownedc/othes lire nowin rags; he who neverwovcfor
hilllself nowoWlisfilielinen.
The rich IIIlIn thirsts ill hissleep, he who ollce hegged himf(n dregs 1I0W
hilS strollgbeer.
Behold, he who understoodnothillgo(lwrpmusicnowOWIIS aharp; he
jt)r whom no ollesong IIOW extols the musie.
BellOld, he wllO wasf(lrcedhypovertyto sleep lllllllllrried, 1I0W hos ladies;
those who lookedtlt theirf;nesill the wilter IIOW ownII mirror.
Behold, those ill high places ill the coulltrynmtllJOut huthave110 lJllsilless
to atlelldto. Thegreat receive 110 lIIessoges. He who was once a
messellger IIOW sellds outsOlllcone else ...
Behold, there orefive lIIell, sent outhy theirlIIosters. Theyslly: go
yourselves, wc hovearrivcd.'
It is transparently clear that this is the description of a kind of
disorder which must appear to the oppressed as a very enviable
state. And yet the poet is difficult to pin down. He expressly
condemns these conditions, even if he does so badly ...
Jonathan Swift suggested in a pamphlet that, in order for the
country to achieve prosperity, the children of the poor should be
pickled and sold as meat. He made precise calculations which
proved that you can save a great deal if you shrink ti'om nothing.
Swift acted as ifhe were stupid. He defended a particular mode of
thinking, which he detested, with great fire and thoroughness, and
in a discussion of an issue where all its nastiness would be fully
recognisable to anyone. Anyone could be cleverer than Swift, or at
least more humane, particularly anyone who until then had not
investigated certain opinions with an eye to the consequences which
followed from them.
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Nazism and Anti-Fascism 1933-1939
Propagandafor thinking, irrespective ofwhere itoccurs, is lIseful to
tire caliseoftire oppressed. This kind of propaganda is very necessary.
Thinking is considered base under regimes which serve exploitation.
Whatever is useful for the downtrodden is considered base.
Constant worry about filling your stomach counts as base; as does
spurning the honours which arc promised to those who defend the
country in which they starve; doubting the FUhrer when he leads the
way into a disaster; being averse to work which does not nourish its
worker; rebelling against the compulsion to senseless behaviour;
being indifferent towards the family, whom interest could no longer
serve. The starving are cursed as greedy, those who have nothing to
defend as cowards, those who doubt their oppressor as those who
doubt their own strength, those who want wages for all their labour
as lazy, and so OIl. Under governments like this, thinking in general
counts as base and into disrepute. It is no longer taught any-
where and, wherever it it is persecuted. Nevertheless, there
are still areas where one can point unpunished to the successes of
thinking; namely thost' areas where the dictatorships need thinking.
So, for example, one can prove the successes of thinking in the field
of the science and technology of war. Stretching out wool supplies
by more efficient organisation and by the invention of wool sub-
stitutes also calls for thinking. The deterioration of foodstuffs, the
training of young people for the war, all of this calls for thinking:
and we are allowed to describe it. Praise of war, that is: of the
unconsidered purpose of all this consideration, can cunningly be
avoided; so the thinking which issues from the question of how a
war can best be waged may lead on to the question of whether this
war makes sense and may contribute to the question of how a
senseless war can best be avoided.
It is difficult, of course, to pose this question in public. So is it not
possible to exploit the thinking which has been propagated, that is
to say to shape it for the purpose of intervention? On the contrary.
In a time like our own, in order for the oppression which serves
the exploitation of the one (larger) section of the population by the
other (smaller) section to remain possible, a very particular kind of
basic attitude is necessary in the population, an attitude which must
153
BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS
extend into all areas. A discovery in the field of zoology, like that of
the Englishman Darwin, was suddenly a threat to exploitation;
nevertheless, for a while only the Church was concerned about it,
whilst the police had not yet noticed anything. The research of
physicists in recent years has had consequences in the field of logic,
which could be a threat to a series of doctrines which serve
oppression. The Prussian state philosopher Hegel, concerned with
difficult investigations in the field of logic, supplied Marx and
Lenin, the classics of the proletarian revolution, with methods of
inestimable value. Developments in the sciences are interrelated but
not simultaneous, and the state is unable to keep an eye on every-
thing. The champions of truth can select battle arenas for
themselves which are relatively unobserved. Everything depends on
the right kind of thinking being taught, a thinking which questions
all things and all processes, and is intent on discovering their
transient and changeable nature.
Our rulers have a great aversion to major changes. They would like
everything to stay the same, preferably for a thousand years. It would
be best of all if the moon stood still and the sun stopped in its tracks!
Then no one would ever get hungry and want to eat their supper.
Once they have fired, their enemies should not be allowed to carryon
shooting, their shot should be the last. A way of thinking which
particularly emphasises the transient is a good means of encouraging
the oppressed. Also, the fact that in each thing and in each condition
a contradiction makes itself felt and grows, that is something which
must be used to oppose the victors. This way oflooking at things (like
the dialectic, the doctrine that things are in flux) can be practised
when investigating the subjects which escape the rulers for a while. It
can be applied in biology or chemistry. But it can also be practised in
describing the fates of a family without arousing too much attention.
The fact that each thing depends on many others, which are
constantly changing, is a dangerous thought for dictatorships, and it
can surface in many guises without offering the police a lever. A
complete description of all the circumstances and processes which
affect a man who wants to open up a newsagent's can be a harsh blow
against dictatorship. Everyone who reflects a little on this will realise
154
Nazism and Anti-Fascism 1933-1939
why. Governments which lead the masses into misery must ensure
that people do not think about the government during this misery.
They talk a lot about destiny. This, rather than they themselves, is
responsible for the distress. Anyone who tries to find out the cause of
the distress is arrested long before he thinks of the government. But
it is possible, in general, to counter this talk of fate; one can
demonstrate that the t ~ l l of man is the work of men.
Again this can occur in a variety of ways. For example, the history
of a farm can be told, such as that of an Icelandic farm. The entire
village is talking about how this farm is cursed. One farmer's wife
has thrown herself down the well, one t ~ l n r has hanged himself.
One day a wedding takes place, the farmer's son marries a girl who
brings a couple of fields into the marriage with her. The curse leaves
the farm. The village is unable to agree in its assessment of this
happy turn of events. Some attribute it to the sunny nature of the
young farmer, others to the fields which the young farmer's wife
brought into the marriage and which made the farm viable for the
first time.
But it is possible to achieve something even in a poem which
describes a landscape, namely if the things created by human beings
are incorporated into nature.
Cunning is necessary for the truth to be spread.
Summary
The great truth of our age (recognition of which does not yet
achieve anything, but without recognition of which no other truth
of importance can be found) is that our part of the globe is sinking
into barbarism because the conditions of ownership of the means of
production are being held on to with violence. What use is it here to
write something courageous which shows that the state into which
we are sinking is barbaric (which is true), if it is not clear why we
have ended up in this state? We have to say that people are being
tortured so that the conditions of ownership will remain the same.
Of course, if we say this we lose many friends who are against torture
because they believe that the conditions of ownership might also be
preserved without torture (which is untrue).
155
1
BRECHT ON ART AND POLITICS
We have to tell the truth about the barbaric conditions 111 our
country,thatthemeasureswhich will makethem disappearcan be
taken,namelythosewhichchangetheconditionsofownership.
Moreover, we must tell it to those who are suffering the most
from theconditionsofownership,whohavethegreatestinterestin
changingthem,theworkers, andthosewhomwe canbringtothem
ascomrades-in-arms,becausetheylikewisedonothaveanysh,lrein
theownershipofthemeansofproduction,even though theyhavea
shareoftheprofits.
Andwe must,fifthly, proceedwithcunning.
Andwe mustsolveallofthesefive difficultiesatoneandthesame
time, for we cannotinvestigate thetruth aboutbarbaricconditions
withoutthinkingofthosewhoaresufferingfrom them, andwhilst,
alwaysshakingoffeverylast vestigeofcowardice, we search for the
truecausal linkswith aneye tothose whoare prepared to use their
knowledge,we mustthinkabouthowtoconveythetruthtothemin
sucha way that it can be a weapon in their hands, and at thesame
timewith such cunningthat this conveyance cannotbe discovered
and preventedbytheenemy.
This much is demanded, when it is demanded that a writer
shouldwritethetruth.
['FiillfSclnvicrigkcitclI "cilll Sc!lrci"clI der \VII/lrhcit', BfA
Written December 1'))4, first published in the anti-fascist journal UIlSl're
Zeit, l'arislHasci/Prague, 19)';, no. 2-3 (April), pp, 2)-)5. It was also pub-
lished as a leaflet to be smuggled into Nazi Germany (some copies
apparently camouflaged with the title Praetiwl Tips filr First /\id). There
seems to have been little response at the time, although Walter Benjamin
accordedit highpraiseinalettertoBrecht:'''FiveDifficultiesinWritingthe
Truth"hasthedrywitandhencethelimitlessdurabilityofa trueclassic. It
is in akindofprosewhichis newtotheGermanlanguage.' Induecourseit
was recognisedas oneofthe most importantofBrecht'sessayson political
aesthetics, andit hasestablished itselfas somethingofa Marxistclassic.
Amongst the several references to the language and policies ofcon-
temporary National Socialism and ofanti-Fascism, it is perhaps worth
pickingoutthatBrecht'sanalysisin section3of Fascismas'themostnaked,
brazen,oppressiveand deceitful fimn ofcapitalism' is consistentwith the
statementbytheCommunistInternationalinDecember193.), thatFascism
156
NazismandAnti-Fascism1933-1939
is 'the open terroristic dictatorship ofthe most reactionary, chauvinistic
andimperialistelementsoftinancecapital'.
Notesonthecatalogueofexamplesarecontainedin BFA 22/906-9. The
'Egyptian poem' is Brecht's own construct pieced together from six
separate 'Admonitionsofa prophet' by Ipu-wer(c. 2500 Be), and quoted
moreorless according to theversions in an anthologybyAdolfErmann,
Die Litemtllr der Agypter (Leipzig, 1923). In 1944 Brecht usedsome ofthe
samematerialagain in the'SongofChaos' in The CillICllsiall Chalk Circle.
40
ANecessaryObservationontheStruggleAgainst
Barbarism
In orderto achieve profits, inourtimescen.'al cropsandcattleare
,
1 :
destroyed. Thedestructionofculturehas nootherpurpose.

Comrades, I would like, without wanting to say anything par-
1'.1
,1
11
1
ticularly new, to say a few words about the struggle against those
powerswhicharenowbentonsuffocatingWesternculturein blood
'I":
,I :','1'
I
and dirt, or, more precisely, those remnants of culture which a
:1:
"
centuryofexploitation has left us with. Iwould like to draw your
attention to just one single point, on which I believe that clarity
must prevail ifwe are to resist these powers effectively and, most
importantly,tothemomentoftheirutterdestruction.
WriterswhoexperiencetheatrocitiesofFascismatfirstorsecond
hand,andwhoareoutragedbythem,arenotthereforein aposition
to resist these atrocities simply by virtue oftheir experience and
senseof outrage,withoutfurtherado.Somepeoplemaybelievethat
it is enough to describe the atrocities, particularly ifgreat literary
talentandgenuineangerlendthedescriptionurgency.And,indeed,
such descriptions are very important. Atrocities are taking place.
Thiscannotbeallowed. Peoplearebeingbeaten.Thisshouldnotbe
happening. What long explanations could be needed? The reader
will surely leap up and restrain the torturers. But comrades,
explanationsareessential.
157